Local courts need to be strong to protect children

The court of law punishes criminals, but some courts either deliver not enough of it, or even allow some cases to be dismissed. Small town courts should be less lenient with criminal cases.

Courts were designed to keep peace and order, but some courts need to be stricter. If a court doesn’t keep the peace, it could cause problems. Further support of this idea is found in “25 Statement by the President on the Duty of Compliance with Supreme Court Decisions,” printed in the American Reference Library on October 1, 2001.

“All Americans are to recognize their duty of complying with the ruling of the court in the land. Anything otherwise would be fraught with grave consequences,” it stated. If courts don’t keep the peace and enforce the law, then people won’t listen.

Most people do not think of small towns having drug problems, but many do. In 2013, Richard Mertens in the article “Heroin a Rising Problem” in the Christian Science Monitor said that, “Heroin: small cities even rural towns face growing problems… these days, the drug is becoming popular in affluent suburbs, small cities, and even rural towns – especially among young people.”

There are local examples of this, although not necessarily related to heroine, when child services removed children from their home and placed them in foster care.

As time goes on, the children do very well, but after rigorous court time to keep children in foster care, a case can simply be thrown out and all charges dropped, sending the children back to the mother who got the children removed for child abuse and drug related arrests in the first place.

Mothers like this still get to keep their children and this town allows this to happen— a mother with drug problems for an extended amount of time, who not only takes the drugs, but also sells drugs to others— even children.

As you are reading this children are in a home, possibly being abused and neglected, and most likely in the presence of drugs. Children have been removed for the same reason multiple times, and each time the cases have been dropped.

It is understandable that the courts give a mother a second chance, but after many times repeating the same acts the court system should not allow children back into that household.

Clearly, some small towns have problems surrounding drugs, and this is harming the children of those towns.

In order for courts to keep the peace and protect the town, they have to punish criminals. In many small towns kids roam the streets, but is it safe?

In “Crime Fighter” printed in Catholic magazine it stated that a young boy was drawn to a criminal lifestyle by his father’s criminal past. At a young age he began committing armed robberies and stealing, and later said that his prison time only made that lifestyle more appealing. Children wandering the streets may fall into the same loop that this young man did.

A counter argument to this would be that not all criminals deserve to be punished very harshly and some need to be given the chance to change their ways before they are punished to the fullest extent. Obviously, having criminals free without proper punishment could drastically effect the youth, so strength is important, especially in a quality court system.

Small towns should have stronger court systems to gain that great quality.